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TANNHAUSEIL 



LONDON; PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STEEET. 



TANNHAUSER 



OR, 



%\t §attle of % §arfr0. 



a Poem* 



BY 



NEVILLE TEMPLE and EDWARD TREVOR. feU. 




LONDON: 

CHAPMAN AND HALL, 193, PICCADILLY. 

1861. 



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The reader is solicited to adopt the German pronunciation of 
Tannhauser, by sounding it as if it were written, in English, 
" Tannhoi'ser." 



©■ 

to 



TANNHAUSER. 



This is the Land, the happy valleys these, 

Broad breadths of plain, blue-vein'd by many a stream, 

Umbrageous hills, sweet glades, and forests fair, 

O'er which our good liege, Landgrave Herman, rules. 

This is Thuringia : yonder, on the heights, 

Is Wartburg, seat of our dear lord's abode, 

Famous through Christendom for many a feat 

Of deftest knights, chief stars of chivalry, 

At tourney in its courts ; nor more renown'd 

For deeds of Prowess than exploits of Art, 



6 TANNHAUSER ; 

Achieved when, vocal in its Muses' hall, 

The minstrel-knights their glorious jousts renew, 

And for the laurel wage harmonious war. 

On this side spreads the Chase in wooded slopes 

And sweet acclivities ; and, all beyond, 

The open flats lie fruitful to the sun 

Full many a league ; till, dark against the sky, 

Bounding the limits of our lord's domain, 

The Hill of Horsel rears his horrid front. 

Woe to the man who wanders in the vast 

Of those unhallow'd solitudes, if Sin, 

Quickening the lust of carnal appetite, 

Lurk secret in his heart : for all their caves 

Echo weird strains of magic, direful-sweet, 

That lap the wanton sense in blissful ease ; 

While through the ear a reptile music creeps, 

And, blandly-busy, round about the soul 

Weaves its fell web of sounds. The unhappy wight, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 

Thus captive made in soft and silken bands 
Of tangled harmony, is led away — 
Away adown the ever-darkening caves, 
Away from fairness and the face of God, 
Away into the mountain's mystic womb, 
To where, reclining on her impious couch 
All the fair length of her lascivious limbs. 
Languid in light from roseate tapers flung, 
Incensed with perfumes, tended on by fays, 
The lustful Queen, waiting damnation, holds 
Her bestial revels. The Queen of Beauty once, 
A goddess call'd and worshipp'd in the days 
When men their own infirmities adored, 
Deeming divine who in themselves summ'd up 
The full-blown passions of humanity. 
Large fame and lavish service had she then, 
Venus yclep'd, of all the Olympian crew 
Least continent of Spirits and most fair. 



S TANNHAUSER ; 

So reap'd she honour of unwistful men, 

Eoman, or Greek, or dwellers on the plains 

Of Egypt, or the isles to utmost Ind ; 

Till came the crack of that tremendous Doom 

That sent the false gods shivering from their seats, 

Shatter 'd the superstitious dome that blear' d 

Heaven's face to man, and on the lurid world 

Let in effulgence of untainted light. 

As when, laid bare beneath the delver's toil 

On some huge bulk of buried masonry 

In hoar Assyria, suddenly reveal'd 

A chamber, gay with sculpture and the pomp 

Of pictur'd tracery on its glowing walls, 

No sooner breathes the wholesome heavenly air 

Than fast its coloured bravery fades, and fall 

Its ruin'd statues, crumbled from their crypts, 

And all its gauds grow dark at sight of day ; 

So darken'd and to dusty ruin fell 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS, 

The fleeting glories of a Pagan faith, 

Bared to Truth's influences bland, and smit 

Blind by the splendours of the Bethlehem Dawn. 

Then from their shatter' d temple in the minds 

Of men, and from their long familiar homes, 

Their altars, fanes, and shrines, the sumptuous seats 

Of their mendacious oracles, out-slunk 

The wantons of Olympus. Forth they fled, 

Forth from Dodona, Delos, and the depths 

Of wooded Ida ; from Athenas forth, 

Cithseron, Paphos, Thebes, and all their groves 

Of oak or poplar, dismally to roam 

About the new-baptized earth ; exiled, 

Bearing the curse, yet suffer'd for a space, 

By Heaven's clear sapience and inscrutable ken, 

To range the wide world, and assay their powers 

To unregenerate redeem'd mankind : 

If haply they by shadows and by shows, 



10 TANNHAUSER; 

Phantasmagoria, and illusions wrought 

Of sight or sound by sorcery, may draw 

Unwary men, or weak, into the nets 

Of Satan their great Captain. She renown'd 

' The fairest,' fleeing from her Cyprian isle, 

Swept to the northwards many a league, and lodged 

At length on Horsel, into whose dark womb 

She crept confounded. Thither soon she drew 

Lewd Spirits to herself, and there abides, 

Holding her devilish orgies ; and has power 

With siren voices crafty to compel 

Into her wanton home unhappy men 

Whose souls to sin are prone. The pure at heart 

Natheless may roam about her pestilent hill 

Untainted, proof against perfidious sounds 

Within whose ears an angel ever sings 

Good tidings of great joy. Nor even they, 

W 7 hose hearts are gross, and who inflamed with lust 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 11 

Enter, entrapp'd by sorceries, to her cave, 

Are damn'd beyond redemption. For a while, 

Slaves of their bodies, in the sloughs of Sin 

They roll contented, wallowing in the arms 

Of their libidinous goddess. But, ere long, 

Comes loathing of the sensual air they breathe, 

Loathing of light unhallow'd, sickening sense 

Of surfeited enjoyment ; and their lips, 

Spurning the reeky pasture, yearn for draughts 

Of rock-rebounding rills, their eyes for sight 

Of Heaven, their limbs for lengths of dewy grass : 

What time sharp Conscience pricks them, and awake 

Starts the requicken'd soul with all her powers, 

And breaks, if so she will, the murderous spell, 

Calling on God. God to her rescue sends 

Voiced seraphims that lead the sinner forth 

From darkness unto day, from foul embrace 

Of that bloat Queen into the mother-lap 



12 TANNHAUSER; 

Of earth, and the caressent airs of Heaven ; 
Where he, by strong persistency of prayer, 
By painful pilgrimage, by lengths of fast 
That tame the rebel flesh, by many a night 
Of vigil, days of deep repentant tears, 
May cleanse his soul of her adulterate stains, 
May from his sin-encrusted spirit shake 
The leprous scales, — and, purely at the feet 
Of his Kedemption falling, may arise 
Of Christ accepted. Whoso doubts the truth, 
Doubting how deep divine Compassion is, 
Lend to my tale a willing ear, and learn. 

Full twenty summers have fled o'er the land, 
A score of winters on our Landgrave's head 
Have shower'd their snowy honours, since the days 
When in his court no nobler knight was known, 
And in his halls no happier bard was heard, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 13 

Than bright Tannhauser. Warrior, minstrel, he 

Throve for a while within the general eye, 

As some king-cedar, in Crusader tales, 

The stateliest growth of Lebanonian groves : 

For now I sing him in his matchless prime, 

Not, as in latter days, defaced and marr'd 

By secret sin, and like the wasted torch 

Pound in the dank grass at the ghastly dawn, 

After a witches' revel. He was a man 

In whom prompt Nature, as in those soft climes 

Where life is indolently opulent, 

Blossom'd unbid to graces barely won 

From tedious culture, where less kindly stars 

Cold influence keep ; and trothful men, who once 

Look'd in his lordly, luminous eyes, and scann'd 

His sinewous frame, compact of pliant power, 

Aver he was the fairest-favour'd knight 

That ever, in the light of ladies' looks, 



14 TANNHAUSER ; 

Made gay these goodly halls. Oh ! deeper dole, 
That so august a Spirit, sphered so fair, 
Should from the starry sessions of his peers 
Decline, to quench so bright a brilliancy 
In Hell's sick spume. Ay me, the deeper dole ! 

From yonder tower the wheeling lapwing loves 

Beyond all others, that o'ertops the pines, 

And from his one white, wistful, window stares 

Into the sullen heart o' the land, — erewhile 

The wandering woodman oft, at nightfall, heard 

A sad, wild strain of solitary song 

Float o'er the forest. Whoso heard it, paused 

Compassionately, cross'd himself, and sigh'd 

c Alas ! poor Princess, to thy piteous moan 

Heaven send sweet peace!' Heaven heard. And now 

she lies 
Under the marble, 'mid the silent tombs, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 15 

Calm with lier kindred ; as her soul above 
Bests with the saints of God. 

The brother's child 
Of our good lord the Landgrave was this maid, 
And here with him abode ; for in the breach 
At Ascalon her sire in Holy Land 
Had fallen, fighting for the Cross. These halls 
Shelter'd her infancy, and here she grew 
Among the shaggy barons, like the pale, 
Mild-eyed, March-violet of the North, that blows 
Bleak under bergs of ice. Full fair she grew, 
And all men loved the rare Elizabeth ; 
But she, of all men, loved one man the most, 
Tannhauser, minstrel, knight, the man in whom 
All mankind flower'd. Fairer growth, indeed, 
Of knighthood never blossom' d to the eye ; 
But, furl'd beneath that florid surface, lurk'd 
A vice of nature, breeding death, not life ; 



16 TANNHAUSER ; 

Such as where some rich Soman, to delight 
Luxurious days with labyrinthian walks 
Of rose and lily, marble fountains, forms 
Wanton of Grace or Nymph, and winding frieze 
With sculpture rough, hath deck'd the summer haunts 
Of his voluptuous villa, — there, festoon'd 
With flowers, among the Graces and the Gods, 
The lurking fever glides. 

A dangerous skill, 
Caught from the custom of those troubadours 
That roam the wanton South, too near the homes 
Of the lost gods, had crept in careless use 
Among our northern bards ; to play the thief 
Upon the poets of a pagan time, 
And steal, to purfle their embroider' d lays, 
Voluptuous trappings of lascivious lore. 
Hence had Tannhauser, from of old, indulged 
In song too lavish license to mislead 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 17 

The sense among those fair but phantom forms 

That haunt the unhallow'd past : wherefrom One Shape 

Forth of the cloudy circle gradual grew 

Distinct, in dissolute beauty. She of old, 

Who from the idle foam uprose, to reign 

In fancies all as idle, — that fair fiend, 

Venus, whose temples are the veins in youth. 

Now more and ever more she mix'd herself 
With all his moods, and whisper' d in his walks ; 
Or through the misty minster, when he kneel'd 
Meek on the flint, athwart the incense-smoke 
She stole on sleeping sunbeams, sprinkled sounds 
Of cymbals through the silver psalms, and marr'd 
His adoration : most of all, whene'er 
He sought to fan those fires of holy love 
That, sleeping oftenest, sometimes leapt to flame, 
Kindled by kindred passion in the eyes 

B 



18 TANNHAUSER; 

Of sweet Elizabeth, round him rose and roll'd 
That miserable magic ; and, at times, 
It drove him forth to wander in the waste 
And desert places, there where prayerless man 
Is most within the power of prowling fiends. 

Time put his sickle in among the days. 
Outcropp'd the coming harvest ; and there came 
An evening with the Princess, when they twain 
Together ranged the terrace that o'erlaps 
The great south garden. All her simple hair 
A single sunbeam from the sleepy west 
O'erfloated ; swam her soft blue eyes suffused 
With tender ruth, and her meek face was moved 
To one slow, serious smile, that stole to find 
Its resting-place on his. 

Then, while he look'd 
On that pure loveliness, within himself 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 19 

He faintly felt a mystery like pure love : 

For through the arid hollows of a heart 

Sered by delirious dreams, the dewy sense 

Of innocent worship stole. The one great word 

That long had hover'd in the silent mind 

Now on the lip half settled ; for not yet 

Had love between them been a spoken sound 

For after speech to lean on ; only here 

And there, where scatter'd pauses strew'd their talk, f 

Love seem'd to o'erpoise the silence, like a star 

Seen through a tender trouble of light clouds. 

But, in that moment, some mysterious touch, 

A thought — who knows? — a memory — something caught 

Perchance from flying fancies, taking form 

Among the sunset clouds, or scented gusts 

Of evening through the gorgeous glooms, shrunk up 

His better angel, and at once awaked 

The carnal creature sleeping in the flesh. 



20 TANNHAUSER ; 

Then died within his heart that word of life 
Unspoken, which, if spoken, might have saved 
The dreadful doom impending. So they twain 
Parted, and nothing said : she to her tower, 
There with meek wonder to renew the calm 
And customary labour of the loom ; 
And he into the gradual-creeping dark 
Which now began to draw the rooks to roost 
Along the windless woods. 

His soul that eve 
Shook strangely if some flickering shadow stole 
Across the slopes where sunset, sleeping out 
The day's last dream, yet linger'd low. Old songs 
Were sweet about his brain, old fancies fair 
O'erflow'd with lurid life the lonely land : 
The twilight troop'd with antic shapes, and swarm'd 
Above him, and the deep mysterious woods 
With mystic music drew him to his doom. 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 21 

So rapt, with idle and with errant foot 
He wander'd on to Horsel, and those glades 
Of melancholy fame, whose poisonous glooms, 
Deck'd with the gleaming hemlock, darkly fringe 
The Mount of Venus. There, a drowsy sense 
Of languor seized him ; and he sat him down 
Among a litter of loose stones and blocks 
Of broken columns, overrun with weed, 
Eemnants of heathen work that sometime propp'd 
A pagan temple. 

Suddenly, the moon, 
Slant from the shoulder of the monstrous hill, 
Swung o'er a sullen lake, and softly touch'd 
With light a shatter'd statue in the weed. 
He lifted up his eyes, and all at once, 
Bright in her baleful beauty, he beheld 
The goddess of his dreams. Beholding whom, 
Lost to his love, forgetful of his faith, 



22 TANNHAUSER; 

And fever'd by the stimulated sense 

Of reprobate desire, the madman cried : 

4 Descend, Dame Venus, on my soul descend ! 

Break up the marble sleep of those still brows 

Where beauty broods ! Down all my senses swim, 

As yonder moon to yonder love-lit lake 

Swims down in glory !' 

Hell the horrid prayer 
Accorded with a curse. Scarce those wild words 
Were utter'd, when like mist the marble moved, 
Flusht with false life. Deep in a sleepy cloud 
He seem'd to sink beneath the sumptuous face 
Lean'd o'er him, — all the whiteness, all the warmth, 
And all the luxury of languid limbs, 
Where violet vein-streaks, lost in limpid lengths 
Of snowy surface, wander faint and fine ; 
Whilst cymbal'd music, stol'n from underneath, 
Creeps through a throbbing light that grows and glows 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 23 

From glare to greater glare, -until it gluts 
And gulfs hira in. 

And from that hour, in court, 
And chase, and tilted tourney, many a month, 
From mass in holy church, and mirth in hall, 
From all the fair assemblage of his peers, 
And all the feudatory festivals, 
Men miss'd Tannhauser. 

At the first, as when 
From some great oak his goodliest branch is lopp'd, 
The little noisy birds, that built about 
The foliage, gather in the gap with shrill 
And querulous curiosity ; even so, 

From all the twittering tongues that throng'd the court 
Rose general hubbub of astonishment, 
And vext surmise about the absent man : 
Why absent ? whither wander'd ? on what quest 
Of errant prowess? — for, as yet, none knew 



24 TANNHAUSER ; 

His miserable fall. But time wore on, 
The wonder wore away ; round absence crept 
The weed of custom, and the absent one 
Became at last a memory, and no more. 

One heart within that memory lived aloof; 
One face, remembering his, forgot to smile ; 
Our Landgrave's niece the old familiar ways 
Walk'd like a ghost with unfamiliar looks. 

Time put his sickle in among the days. 
The rose burn'd out ; red Autumn lit the woods ; 
The last snows, melting, changed to snowy clouds ; 
And Spring once more with incantations came 
To wake the buried year. Then did our liege, 
Lord Landgrave Herman — for he loved his niece, 
And lightly from her simple heart had won 
The secret of lost smiles, and why she droop'd, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 25 

A wilted flower — thinking to dispel, 

If that might be, her mournfulness, let cry 

By heralds that, at coming Whitsuntide, 

The minstrel-knights in Wartburg should convene 

To hold high combat in the craft of song, 

And sing before the Princess for the prize. 

But, ere that time, it fell upon a day 

When our good lord went forth to hunt the hart, 

That he with certain of his court, 'mid whom 

Was Wolfram, — once Tannhauser's friend, himself 

Among the minstrels held in high renown — 

Came down the Wartburg valley, where they deem'd 

To hold the hart at siege, and found him not : 

But found, far down, at bottom of the glade, 

Beneath a broken cross, a lonely knight 

Who sat on a great stone, watching the clouds. 

And Wolfram, being a little in the van 



26 TANNHAUSER; 

Of all his fellows, eager for the hunt, 

Hurriedly ran to question of the knight 

If he had view'd the hart. But when he came 

To parley with him, suddenly he gave 

A shout of great good cheer ; for, all at once, 

In that same knight he saw, and knew, though changed; 

Tannhauser, his old friend and fellow-bard. 

Xow, Wolfram long had loved Elizabeth 
As one should love a star in heaven, who knows 
The distance of it, and the reachlessness. 
But when he knew Tannhauser in her heart, 
(For loving eyes in eyes beloved are swift 
To search out secrets) not the less his own 
Clave unto both ; and, from that time, his love 
Lived like an orphan child in charity, 
Whose loss came early, and is gently borne, 
Too deep for tears, too constant for complaint. 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 27 

And, therefore, in the absence of his friend 

His inmost heart was heavy, when he saw 

The shadow of that absence in the face 

He loved beyond all faces upon earth. 

So that when now he found that friend again 

Whom he had miss'd and mourn'd, right glad was he 

Both for his own and for the Princess' sake : 

And ran and fell upon Tannhauser's neck, 

And all for joy constrain'd him to his heart, 

Calling his fellows from the neighbouring hills, 

Who, crowding, came, great hearts and open arms 

To welcome back their peer. The Landgrave then, 

When he perceived his well-beloved knight, 

Was passing glad, and would have question'd him 

Of his long absence. But the man himself 

Could answer nothing ; staring with blank eyes 

From face to face, then up into the blue 

Bland heavens above ; astonied, and like one 



28 TANNHAUSER ; 

Who, suddenly awaking out of sleep 

After sore sickness, knows his friends again, 

And would peruse their faces, but breaks off 

To list the frolic bleating of the lamb 

In far-off fields, and wonder at the world 

And all its strangeness. Then, while the glad knights 

Clung round him, wrung his hands, and dinn'd his ears 

With clattering query, our fair lord himself 

Unfolded how, upon the morrow morn, 

There should be holden festive in his halls 

High meeting of the minstrels of the land, 

To sing before the Princess for the prize : 

Whereto he bade him with ' sir, be sure 

There lives a young voice that shall tax your wit 

To justify this absence from your friends. 

We trust, at least, that you have brought us back 

A score of giants' beards, or dragons' tails, 

To lay them at the feet of our fair niece. 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 29 

For think not, truant, that Elizabeth 
Will hold you lightly quitted.' 

At that name, 
Elizabeth, he started as a man 
That hears on foreign shores, from alien lips, 
Some name familiar to his fatherland ; 
And all at once the man's heart inly yearns 
For brooks that bubble, and for woods that wave 
Before his father's door, while he forgets 
The forms about him. So Tannhauser mused 
A little space, then falter'd : ■ my liege, 
6 Fares my good lady well ? — I pray my lord 
That I may draw me hence a little while, 
For all my mind is troubled : and, indeed, 
I know not if my harp have lost his skill, 
But, skill'd, or skilless, it shall find some tone 
To render thanks to-morrow to my lord ; 
To whose behests a bondsman, in so far 



30 TANXHAUSER; 

As my poor service holds, I will assay 
To sing before the Princess for the prize.' 

Then, on the morrow morn, from far and near 

Flow'd in the feudatory lords. The hills 

Broke out ablaze with banners, and rung loud 

With tingling trumpet notes, and neighing steeds. 

For all the land, elate with lusty life, 

Buzz'd like a beehive in the sun ; and all 

The castle swarm'd from bridge to barbican 

With mantle and with mail, whilst minster-bells 

Eang hoarse their happy chimes, till the high noon 

Clang'd from the towers. Then, o'er the platform stoled 

And canopied in crimson, lightly blew 

The scepter'd heralds on the silver trump 

Intense sonorous music, sounding in 

The knights to hall. Shrill clink'd the corridors 

Through all the courts with clashing heels, or moved 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 31 

With silken murmurs, and elastic sounds 

Of lady laughters light ; as in they flow'd 

Lord, Liegeman, Peer, and Prince, and Paladin, 

And dame and damsel, clad in dimpling silk 

And gleaming pearl ; who, while the groaning roofs 

Ke-echo'd royal music, swept adown 

The spacious hall, with due obeisance made 

To the high dais, and on glittering seats 

Dropp'd one by one, like flocks of burnish'd birds 

That settle down with sunset-painted plumes 

On gorgeous woods. Again from the outer wall 

The intermitted trumpet blared ; and each 

Pert page, a-tiptoe, from the benches lean'd 

To see the minstrel -knights, gold-filleted, 

That enter'd now the hall : Sir Mandeville, 

The swan of Eisnach ; Wilfrid of the Hills ; 

Wolfram., surnamed of Willow-brook ; and next 

Tannhauser, christen'd of the Golden Harp ; 



32 TANNHAUSER ; 

With Walter of the Heron-chase ; and Max, 
The seer ; Sir Kudolf, of the Eaven-crest ; 
And Franz, the falconer. They enter'd, each 
In order, follow'd by a blooming boy 
That bore his harp, and, pacing forward, bow'd 
Before the Landgrave and Elizabeth. 

Pale sat the Princess in her chair of state, 

Perusing with fix'd eyes, that all belied 

Her throbbing heart, the carven architrave, 

Whereon the intricate much-vex'd design 

Of leaf and stem disintertwined itself 

With infinite laboriousness, at last 

Escaping in a flight of angel forms ; 

As tho' the carver's thought had been to show 

The weary struggle of the soul to free 

Her flight from earth's bewilderment, and all 

That frets her in the flesh. But when, erewhile, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 33 

The minstrels enter'd, and Tannhauser bow'd 
Before the dais, the Landgrave, at her side, 
Saw, as he mused what theme to give for song, 
The pallid forehead of Elizabeth 
Plush to the fair roots of her golden hair, 
And thought within himself : * Our knight delays 
To own a love that aims so near our throne ; 
Hence, haply, this late absence from our court, 
And those bewilder'd moods which I have mark'd : 
But since love lightly catches, where it can, 
At any means to make itself approved, 
And since the singer may to song confide 
What the man dares not trust to simple speech, 
I, therefore, so to ease two hearts at once, 
And signify our favour unto both, 
Will to our well-beloved minstrels give 
No theme less sweet than Love : for, surely, be 
That loves the best, will sing the best, and bear 

C 



34 TANNHAUSER ; 

The prize from all.' Therewith the Landgrave rose, 
And all the murmuring Hall was hush'd to hear. 

' well-beloved minstrels, in my mind 

I do embrace you all, and heartily 

Bid you a lavish welcome to these halls. 

Oft have you flooded this fair space with song, 

Waked these voiced walls, and vocal made yon roof, 

As waves of surging music lapp'd against 

Its resonant rafters. Often have your strains 

Ennobled souls, of true nobility, 

Eapt by your perfect pleadings in the cause 

Of all things pure unto a purer sense 

Of their exceeding loveliness. No power 

Is subtler o'er the spirit of man than Song — 

Sweet echo of great thoughts, that, in the mind 

Of him who hears congenial echoes waking, 

Eemultiplies the praise of what is good. 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 35 

Song cheers the emulous spirit to the top 

Of Virtue's rugged steep, from whence, all heights 

Of human worth attain'd, the mortal may 

Conjecture of God's unattainable, 

Which is Perfection. — Faith, with her sisters twain 

Of Hope and Charity, ye oft have sung, 

And loyal Truth have lauded, and have wreathed 

A coronal of music round the brows 

Of stainless Chastity ; nor less have praised 

High-minded Valour, in whose righteous hand 

Burns the great sword of flaming Fortitude, 

And have stirr'd up to deeds of high emprize 

Our noble knights (yourselves among the noblest) 

Whether on German soil for me, their prince, 

Fighting, or in the Land of Christ for God. 

Sing ye to-day another theme ; to-day 

Within our glad society we see, 

To fellowship of loving friends restored, 



36 TANNHAUSER; 

A long-miss'd face ; and hungerly our ears 

Wait the melodious murmurs of a harp 

That wont to feed them daintily. What drew 

Our singer forth, and led the fairest light 

Of all our galaxy to swerve astray 

From his fix'd orbit 5 and what now respheres, 

After deflection long, our errant orb, 

Implies a secret that the subtle power 

Of Song, perchance, may solve. Be then your theme 

As universal as the heart of man, 

Giving you scope to touch its deepest depths, 

Its highest heights, and reverently to explore 

Its mystery of mysteries. Sing of Love : 

Tell us, ye noble poets, from what source 

Springs the prime passion ; to what goal it tends ; 

Sing it how brave, how beautiful, how bright, 

In essence how ethereal, in effect 

How palpable, how human yet divine. 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 37 

Up ! up ! loved singers, smite into the chords, 
The lists are open'd, set your lays in rest, 
And who of Love best chants the perfect praise, 
Him shall Elizabeth as conqueror hail 
And round his royal temples bind the bays.' 

He said, and sat. And from the middle-hall 

Four pages, bearers of the blazon'd urn 

That held the name-scrolls of the listed bards, 

Moved to Elizabeth. Daintily her hand 

Dipp'd in the bowl, and one drawn scroll deliver'd 

Back to the pages, who, perusing, cried : 

■ Sir Wolfram of the Willow-brook, — begin.' 

Up-rose the gentle singer — he whose lays, 
Melodious-melancholy, through the Land 
Live to this day — and, fair obeisance made, 
Assumed his harp and stood in act to sing. 



38 TANNHAUSER; 

Awhile, his dreamy fingers o'er the chords 
Wander' d at will, and to the roof was turn'd 
His meditative face ; till, suddenly, 
A soft light from his spiritual eyes 
Broke, and his canticle he thus began : 

' Love among the saints of God, 
Love within the hearts of men, 
Love in every kindly sod 
That breeds a violet in the glen ; 
Love in heaven, and Love on earth, 
Love in all the amorous air ; 
Whence comes Love ? ah ! tell me where 
Had such a gracious Presence birth ? 
Lift thy thoughts to Him, all-knowing, 
In the hallow'd courts above ; 
From His throne, for ever flowing, 
Springs the fountain of all Love : 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 39 

Down to earth the stream descending 
Meets the hills, and murmurs then, 
In a myriad channels wending, 
Through the happy haunts of men. 
Blessed ye, earth's sons and daughters, 
Love among you flowing free ; 
Guard, oh ! guard its sacred waters, 
Tend on them religiously : 
Let them through your hearts steal sweetly. 
With the Spirit, wise and bland, 
Minister unto them meetly, 
Touch them not with carnal hand. 

* Maiden, fashion'd so divinely, 
Whom I worship from afar, 
Smile thou on my soul benignly, 
Sweet, my solitary star : 
Gentle harbinger of gladness, 



40 TANNHAUSER ; 

Still be with me on the way ; 
Only soother of my sadness, 
Always near, though far away : 
Always near, since first upon me 
Fell thy brightness from above, 
And my troubled heart within me 
Felt the sudden flow of Love ; 
At thy sight that gushing river 
Paused, and fell to perfect rest, 
And the pool of Love for ever 
Took thy image to its breast. 

' Let me keep my passion purely, 
Guard its waters free from blame, 
Hallow Love, as knowing surely 
It returneth whence it came ; 
From all channels, good or evil, 
Love, to its pure source enticed, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 41 

Finds its own immortal level 
In the charity of Christ. 

Ye who hear, behold the river, 
Whence it cometh, whither goes ; 
Glory be to God, the Giver, 
From whose grace the fountain flows ; 
Flows and spreads through all creation, 
Counter-charm of every curse, 
Love, the waters of Salvation, 
Flowing through the universe !' 

And still the rapt bard, though his voice had ceased, 
And all the Hall had murmur'd into praise, 
Pursued his plaintive theme among the chords, 
Blending with instinct fine the intricate throng 
Of thoughts that flow'd beneath his touch to find 
Harmonious resolution. As he closed, 



42 TANNHAUSER ; 

Tannhauser rising, fretted with delay, 

Sent flying fingers o'er the strings, and sang : 

' Love be my theme ! Sing her awake, 
My harp, for she hath tamely slept 
In Wolfram's song, a stagnant lake 
O'er which a shivering star hath crept. 

' Awake, dull waters, from your sleep, 
Eise, Love, from thy delicious well, 
A fountain ! — yea, but flowing deep 
With nectar and with hydromel ; 

1 With gurgling murmurs sweet, that teach 
My soul a sleep-distracting dream, 
Till on the marge I lie, and reach 
My longing lips towards the stream ; 

1 Whose waves leap upwards to the brink, 
With drowning kisses to invite 
And drag me, willing, down to drink 
Delirious draughts of rare Delight ; 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 43 

* Who careless drink, as knowing well 
The happy pastime shall not tire, 
For Love is inexhaustible, 
And all-unfailing my Desire. 



1 Love's fountain-marge is fairly spread 
With every incense-flower that blows, 
With flossy sedge, and moss that grows 
For fervid limbs a dewy bed ; 

' And fays and fairies flit and wend 
To keep the sweet stream flowing free, 
And on Love's languid votary 
The little elves delighted tend ; 

' And bring him honey-dews to sip, 
Rare balms to cool him after play, 
Or with sweet unguents smooth away 
The kiss-crease on his ruffled lip ; 



44 TANNHAUSER ; 

' And lilywhite his limbs they lave, 
And roses in his cheeks renew, 
That he, refresh'd, return to glue 
His lips to Love's caressent wave ; 

' And feel, in that immortal kiss, 
His mortal instincts die the death, 
And human fancy fade beneath 
The taste of unimagined bliss ! 



' Thus, gentle audience, since your ear 
Best loves a metaphoric lay, 
Of mighty Love I warble here 
In figures, such as Fancy may : 

' Now know ye how of Love I think 
As of a fountain, failing never, 
On whose soft marge I lie, and drink 
Delicious draughts of Joy for ever.' 

Abrupt he ceased, and sat. And for a space, 
No longer than the subtle lightning rests 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 45 

Upon a sultry cloud at eventide, 
The Princess smiled, and on her parted lips 
Hung inarticulate applause ; but she 
Sudden was ware that all the hall was mute 
With blank disapprobation ; and her smile 
Died, and vague fear was quicken'd in her heart 
As Walter of the Heron-chase began : 

' fountain ever fair and bright, 
He hath beheld thee, source of Love, 
W T ho sung thee springing from above, 
Celestial from the founts of Light ; 

' But he who from thy waters rare 
Hath thought to drain a gross delight, 
Blind in his spiritual sight, 
Hath ne'er beheld thee, fountain fair ! 

' Hath never seen the silver glow 
Of thy glad waves, crystalline clear, 
Hath never heard within his ear 
The music of thy murmurous flow. 



46 TANNHAUSER ; 

' The essence of all Good thou art, 
Thy waters are immortal Kuth, 
Thy murmurs are the voice of Truth, 
And music in the human heart : 

' Thou yieldest Faith that soars on high, 
And Sympathy that dwells on earth ; 
The tender trust in human worth, 
The hope that lives beyond the sky. 

' Oh ! waters of the living Word, 
Oh ! fair vouchsafed us from above, 
Oh ! fountain of immortal Love 
What song of thee erewhile I heard ! 

4 Learn, sacrilegious bard, from me 
How all ignoble was thy strain, 
That sought with trivial song to stain 
The fountain of Love's purity ; 

' That fountain thou hast never found, 
And should'st thou come with lips of fire 
To slake the thirst of brute Desire, 
'T would shrink and shrivel to the ground : 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 47 

' Who seeks in Love's pure stream to lave 
His gross heart finds damnation near ; 
Who laves in Love his spirit clear 
Shall win Salvation from the wave.' 

And now again, as when the plaintive lay 
Of Wolfram warbled to harmonious close, 
The crowd grew glad with plaudits ; and again 
Tannhauser, ruffled, rose his height, and smote 
Eude in the chords his prelude of reply : 

' What Love is this that melts with Euth, 
Whose murmurs are the voice of Truth ? 
Ye dazed singers, cease to dream, 
And learn of me your human theme : 
Of that great Passion at whose feet 
The vassal-world lies low, 
Of Love the mighty, Love the sweet, 
I sing, who reigns below ; 



48 TANNHAUSER ; 

Who makes men fierce, tame, wild, or kind, 

Sovran of every mood, 

Who rules the heart, and rules the mind, 

And courses through the blood : 

Slave, of that lavish Power I sing, 

Dispenser of all good, 

Whose pleasure-fountain is the spring 

Of sole beatitude. 

* Sing ye of Love ye ne'er possess'd 
In wretched tropes — a vain employment ! 
I sing the passion in my breast, 
And know Love only in Enjoyment.' 

To whom, while all the rustling hall was moved 
W 7 ith stormy indignation, stern up-rose, 
Sharp in retort, Sir Wilfrid of the hills : 

' Up, minstrels ! rally to the cry 
Of outraged Love and Loyalty ; 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 49 

Drive on this slanderer, all the throng, 

And slay him in a storm of song. 

Oh lecher ! shall I sing to thee 

Of Love's untainted purity, 

Of simple Faith, and tender Euth, 

Of Chastity and loyal Truth ? 

As well sing Day's resplendent birth 

To the blind mole that delves the earth 

As seek from gross hearts, slough' d in sin, 

Approval of pure Love to win ! 

Eather from thee I'll wring applause 

For Love, the Avenger of his cause ; 

Great Love, the chivalrous and strong, 

To whose wide grasp all arms belong, 

The lance, the battle-axe, and thong, — 

And eke the mastery in song. 

' Love in my heart in all the pride 
Of kinghood sits, and at his side, 



50 TANNHAUSER; 

To do the bidding of his lord, 
Martial Valour holds the sword ; 
He strikes for Honour, in the name 
Of Virtue and fair woman's fame, 
And bids me shed my dearest blood 
To venge aspersed maidenhood : 
Who soils her with licentious lie, 
Him will I hew both hip and thigh, 
Or in her cause will dearly die. 
But thou, who in thy flashy song 
Hast sought to do all Honour wrong, 
Pass on, — I will not stoop my crest 
To smite thee, nor lay lance in rest. 
Thy brawling words, of riot born, 
Are worthy only of my scorn ; 
Thus at thy ears this song I fling, 
Which in thy heart may plant its sting, 
If ruin'd Conscience yet may wring 
Eemorse from such a guilty thing.' 



OK, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 51 



Scarce from his lips had parted the last word 
When, through the rapturous praise that rang around, 
Fierce from his seat up-rising, red with rage, 
With scornful lip, and contumelious eye, 
Tannhauser clang'd among the chords, and sang : 

' Floutest thou me, thou grisly Bard ? 
Beware, lest I the just reward 
On thy puff'd insolence bestow, 
And cleave thee with my falchion's blow, — 
When I in song have laid thee low. 
I serve a Mistress mightier far 
Than tinkling rill, or twinkling star, 
And, as in my great Passion's glow 
Thy passion-dream will melt like snow, 
So I, Love's champion, at her call, 



52 TANNHAUSER ; 

Will make thee shrink in field or hall, 
And roll before me like a ball. 

1 Thou pauper-minded pedant dim, 
Thou starveling-soul, lean heart and grim, 
Wouldst thou of Love the praises hymn ? 
Then let the gaunt hyena howl 
In praise of Pity ; let the owl 
Whoop the high glories of the noon, 
And the hoarse chough becroak the moon ! 
What canst thou prate of Love ? I trow 
She never graced thy open brow, 
Nor flush' d thy cheek, nor blossom'd fair 
Upon thy parted lips ; nor e'er 
Bade unpent passion wildly start 
Through the forced portals of thy heart 
To stream in triumph from thine eye, 
Or else delicious death to die 
On other lips, in sigh on sigh. 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 53 

* Of Love, dispenser of all bliss, 
Of Love, that crowns me with a kiss, 
I here proclaim me champion-knight ; 
And in her cause will dearly fight 
With sword or song, in hall or plain, 
And make the welkin ring again 
With my fierce blows, or fervent strain. 
But for such Love, as thou canst feel, 
Thou wisely hast abjured the steel, 
Averse to lay thy hand on hilt , 
Or in her honour ride a tilt : 
Tame Love full tamely may'st thou jilt, 
And keep bone whole, and blood unspilt.' 

Outflash'd Sir Wilfrid's weapon, and outleapt 
From every angry eye a thousand darts 
Of unsheath'd indignation, and a shout 
Went up among the rafters, and the Hall 
Swa}^'d to and fro with tumult ; till the voice 



54 TANNHAUSER ; 

Of our liege lord roared ' Peace I ■ and, 'midst the clang 

Of those who parted the incensed bards, 

Sounded the harp of Wolfram. Calm he stood, 

He only calm of all the brawling crowd, 

Which yet, as is its wont, contagion caught 

From neighbouring nobleness, and a stillness fell 

On all, and in the stillness soft he sang : 

' Oh ! from your sacred seats look down, 
Angels and ministers of good ; 
With sanctity our spirits crown, 
And crush the vices of the blood ! 

' Open our hearts and set them free, 
That heavenly light may enter in ; 
And from this fair society 
Obliterate the taint of sin. 

' Thee, holy Love, I bid arise 
Propitious to my votive lay ; 
Shine thou upon our darken' d eyes, 
And lead us on the perfect way ; 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 55 

' As, in the likeness of a Star, 
Thou once arosest, guidance meet, 
And led'st the sages from afar 
To sit at holy Jesu's feet : 

' So guide us, safe from Satan's snares, 
Shine out, sweet Star, around, above, 
Till we have scaled the mighty stairs, 
And reach' d thy mansions, Heavenly Love !' 

Then, while great shouts went up of ' Give the prize 
To Wolfram,' leapt Tannhauser from his seat, 
Fierce passion naming from his lustrous orbs. 
And, as a sinner, desperate to add 
Depth to damnation by one latest crime, 
Dies boastful of his blasphemies — even so, 
Tannhauser, conscious of the last disgrace 
Incurr'd by such song in such company, 
Intent to vaunt the vastness of his sin, 
Thus, as in ecstacy, the song renew'd : 



56 TANNHAUSER; 

' Goddess of Beauty, thee I hymn, 
And ever worship at thy shrine ; 
Thou, who on mortal senses dim 
Descending, makest man divine! 

' Who hath embraced thee on thy throne, 
And pastured on thy royal kiss, 
He, happy, knows, and knows alone, 
Love's full beatitude of bliss. 

1 Grim bards, of Love who nothing know, 
Now cease the unequal strife between us ; 
Dare as I dared ; to Horsel go, 
And taste Love on the lips of Venus.' 

Up-rose on every side and rustled down 

The affrighted dames ; and, like the shuddering crowd 

Of particolour'd leaves that flits before 

The gust of mid October, all at once 

A hundred jewell'd shoulders, huddling, swept 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 57 

The hall, and slanted to the doors, and fled 

Before the storm, which now from shaggy brows 

'Gan dart indignant lightnings. One alone 

Of all that awe-struck womanhood remain'd, 

The Princess. She, a purple hairbell frail, 

That, swathed with whirlwind, to the bleak rock clings 

When half a forest falls before the blast, 

Eooted in utter wretchedness, and robed 

In mockery of splendid state, still sat ; 

Still watch'd the waste that widen'd in her life ; 

And look'd as one that in a nightmare hangs 

Upon an edge of horror, while from beneath 

The creeping billow of calamity 

Sprays all his hair with cold ; but hand or foot 

He may not move, because the formless Fear 

Gapes vast behind him. Grief within the void 

Of her stark eyes stood tearless : terror blanch'd 



58 TANNHAUSER ; 

Her countenance ; and, over cloudy brows, 
The shaken diamond made a restless light, 
And trembled as the trembling star that hangs 
O'er Cassiopeia i' the windy north. 

But now, from farthest end to end of all 
The sullen movement swarming underneath, 
Uproll'd deep hollow groans of growing wrath. 
And, where erewhile in rainbow crescent ranged 
The bright-eyed beauties of the court, fast throng'd 
Faces inflamed with wrath, that rose and fell 
Tumultuously gathering from between 
Sharp-slanting lanes of steel. For every sword 
Flash'd bare upon a sudden ; and over these, 
Through the wide bursten doors the sinking sun 
Stream'd lurid, lighting up that steely sea ; 
Which, spotted white with foamy plumes, and ridged 
With glittering iron, clash'd together and closed 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 59 

About Tannhauser. Careless of the wrath 

Roused by his own rash song, the singer stood ; 

Kapt in remembrance, or by fancy fool'd 

A visionary Venus to pursue, 

With eyes that roam'd in rapture the blank air. 

Until the sharp light of a hundred swords 

Smote on the fatal trance, and scatter'd all 

Its fervid fascination. Swift from sheath 

Then leapt the glaive and glitter'd in his hand 

And warily, with eye upon the watch, 

Eeceding to the mighty main support 

That, from the centre, propp'd the ponderous roof, 

These, based against the pillar, fronting full 

His sudden foes, he rested resolute, 

Waiting assault. 

But, hollow as a bell, 
That tolls for temnest from a storm-clad tower, 
Rang through the jangling shock of arms and men 



60 TANNHAUSER ; 

The loud voice of the Landgrave. Wide he swept 
The solemn sceptre, crying ' Peace!' then said : 

' Ye Lieges of Thuringia ! whose just scorn, 

In judgment sitting on your righteous brows, 

Would seem to have forecast the dubious doom 

Awaiting our decision ; ye have heard, 

Not wrung by torture from reluctant lips, 

Nor yet breathed forth with penitential pain 

In prayer for pardon, nay, but rather fledged 

And barb'd with boastful insolence, such a crime 

Confest, as turns to burning coals of wrath 

The dewy eyes of Pity, nor to Hope 

One refuge spares, save such as rests perchance 

Within the bounteous bosom of the Church ; 

Who, caring for the frailty of her flock, 

Holds mercy measureless as heaven is high. 

Shuddering, ourselves have listen'd to what breaks 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 61 

All bonds that bound to this unhappy man 

The covenanted courtesies of knights, 

The loyalties of lives by faith knit fast 

In spiritual communion. What behoves, 

After deliberation, to award 

In sentence, I to your high council leave, 

Undoubting. What may mitigate in aught 

The weight of this acknowledged infamy 

Weigh with due balance. What to justice stern 

Mild-minded mercy yet may reconcile 

Search inly. Not with rashness, not in wrath, 

Invoking from the right hand of high God 

His dread irrevocable angel, Death ; 

Yet not unwary how one spark of hell, 

If unextinguish'd, down the night of time 

May, like the wreckers' beacon from the reefs, 

Lure many to destruction : nor indeed 

Unmindful of the doom by fire or steel 

This realm's supreme tribunals have reserved 



62 TANNHAUSER ; 

For those that, dealing in damnation, hold 
Dark commerce with the common foe of man. 
Weigh you in all its circumstance this crime : 
And, worthily judging, though your judgment be 
As sharp as conscience, be it as conscience clear.' 

He ended : and a bitter interval 

Of silence o'er the solemn hall congeaPd, 

Like frost on a waste water, in a place 

Where rocks confront each other. Marshall'd round, 

Black-bearded cheek and chin, with hand on heft, 

Bent o'er the pommels of their planted swords, 

A dreary cirque of faces ominous, 

The sullen barons on each other stared 

Significant. As, ere the storm descends 

Upon a Druid grove, the great trees stand 

Looking one way, and stiller than their wont, 

Until the thunder, rolling, frees the wind 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 63 

That rocks them altogether ; even so, 
That savage circle of grim-gnarled men, 
Awhile in silence storing stormy thoughts, 
Stood breathless ; till a nmrmur moved them ail, 
And louder growing, and louder, burst at last 
To a universal irrepressible roar 
Of voices roaring, ' Let him die the death !' 
And, in that roar released, a hundred swords 
Eush'd forward, and in narrowing circle sloped 
Sharp rims of shining horror round the doom'd, 
Undaunted minstrel. Then a piteous cry ; 
And from the purple baldachin down sprang 
The Princess, gleaming like a ghost, and slid 
Among the swords, and standing in the midst 
Swept a wild arm of prohibition forth. 
Cowering, recoil'd the angry, baffled surge, 
Leaving on either side a horrid hedge 
Of rifted glare, as when the Ked Sea waves 



64 TANNHAUSER ; 

Hung heap'd and sunder'd, ere they roaring fell 
On Egypt's chariots. So there came a hush ; 
And in the hush her voice, heavy with scorn : 

' Or shall I call you men ? or beasts ? who seem 
No nobler than the bloodhound and the wolf 
Which scorn to prey upon their proper kind ! 
Christians I will not call you ! who defraud 
That much-misapprehended holy name 
Of reverence due by such a deed as, done, 
Will clash against the charities of Christ, 
And make a marr'd thing and a mockery 
Of the fair face of Mercy. You dull hearts, 
And hard ! have ye no pity for yourselves ? 
For man no pity ? man whose common cause 
Is shamed and sadden'd by the stain that falls 
Upon a noble nature ! You blind hands, 
Thrust out so fast to smite a fallen friend ! 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 65 

Did ye not all conspire, whilst yet lie stood 
The stateliest soul among you, to set forth 
And fix him in the foremost ranks of men ? 
Content that he, your best, should bear the brunt, 
And head the van against the scornful fiend 
That will not waste his weapons on the herd, 
But saves them for the noblest. And shall Hell 
Triumph through you, that triumph in the shame 
Of this eclipse that blots your brightest out, 
And leaves you dark in his extinguish'd light? 
Oh, who that lives but hath within his heart 
Some cause to dread the suddenness of death ? 
And God is merciful ; and suffers us, 
Even for our sins' sake ; and doth spare us time, 
Time to grow ready, time to take farewell ! 
And sends us monitors and ministers — 
Old age, that steals the fullness from the veins ; 
And griefs, that take the glory from the eyes ; 
And pains, that bring us timely news of death ; 
And tears, that teach us to be glad of him. 

E 



66 TANNHAUSER; 

For who can take farewell of all his sins 
On such a sudden summons to the grave ? 
Against high Heaven hath this man sinn'd, or you ? 
Oh, if it be against high Heaven, to Heaven 
Eemit the compt ! lest, from the armoury 
Of The Eternal Justice ye pluck down, 
Heedless, that bolt The Highest yet withholds 
From this low-fallen head, — how fall'n ! how low ! 
Yet not so fall'n, not so low fall'n, but what 
Divine Eedemption, reaching everywhere, 
May reach at last even to this wretchedness, 
And, out of late repentance, raise it up 
With pardon into peace.' 

She paused : she touch'd, 
As with an angel's finger, him whose pride 
Obdurate now had yielded, and he lay, 
Vanquish' d by Pity, broken at her feet. 
She, lingering, waited answer, but none came 
Across the silence. And again she spake : 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 67 

' Oh, not for him alone, and not for that 

Which to remember now makes life for me 

A wilderness of homeless griefs, I plead 

Before you ; but, Princes, for yourselves ; 

For all that in your nobler nature stirs 

To vindicate Forgiveness and enlarge 

The lovely laws of Pity ! Which of you, 

Here in the witness of all-judging God, 

Stands spotless ? Which of you will boast himself 

More miserably injured by this man 

Than I, whose heart of all that lived in it 

He hath untenanted ? Oh horrible ! 

Unheard of ! from the blessed lap of life 

To send the soul, asleep in all her sins, 

Down to perdition ! Be not yours the hands 

To do this desperate wrong in sight of all 

The ruthful faces of the Saints in Heaven/ 



68 TANNHAUSER ; 

She passionately pleading thus, her voice 

Over their hearts moved like that earnest wind 

That, labouring long against some great night-cloud, 

Sets free, at last, a solitary star, 

Then sinks ; but leaves the night not all forlorn 

Ere the soft rain o'ercomes it. 

This long while 
Wolfram, whose harp and voice were overborne 
By burly brawlers in the turbulence 
That shook that stormy senate, stood apart 
With vainly-vigilant eye, and writhen hands, 
All in mute trouble : too gentle to approve, 
Too gentle to prevent, what pass'd : and still 
Divided in himself 'twixt sharpest grief 
To see his friend so fallen, and a drear 
Strange horror of the crime whereby he fell. 
So, like a headland light that down dark waves 
Shines o'er some sinking ship it fails to save, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 69 

Look'd the pale singer down the lurid hall. 

But when the pure voice of Elizabeth 

Ceased, and clearlighted all with noble thoughts 

Her face glow'd as an angel's, the sweet Bard , 

Whose generous heart had scaled with that loved voice 

Up to the lofty levels where it ceased, 

Stood forth, and from the dubious silence caught 

And carried up the purpose of her prayer ; 

And drew it out, and drove it to the heart, 

And clench'd it with conviction in the mind, 

And fix'd it firm in judgment. 

From deep muse 
The Landgrave started, toward Tannhauser strode, 
And, standing o'er him with an eye wherein 
Salt sorrow and a moody pity gleam'd, 
Spake hoarse of utterance : 

1 Arise ! go forth ! 
Go from us, mantled in the shames which make 



70 TANNHAUSER; 

Thee, stranger whom mine eye henceforth abhors, 
The mockery of the man I loved, and mourn. 
Go from these halls yet holy with the voice 
Of her whose intercession for thy sake, — 
If any sacred sorrow yet survive 
All ruin'd virtues, — in remorse shall steep 
The memory of her wrongs. For thee remains 
One hope, unhappiest ! reject it not. 
There goeth a holy pilgrimage to Eome, 
Which not yet from the borders of our land 
Is parted ; pious souls and meek, whom thou 
Haply may'st join, and of those holy hands, 
Which sole have power to bind or loose, receive 
Eemission of thy sin. For save alone 
The hand of Christ's high Vicar upon earth 
A hurt so heinous what may heal ? What save 
A soul so fall'n ? Go forth upon thy ways, 
Which are not ours : for we no more may mix 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 71 

Congenial minds in converse sweet, no more 
Together pace these halls, nor ever hear 
Thy harp as once when all was pure and glad, 
Among the days which have been. All thy paths 
Henceforth be paths of penitence and prayer, 
Whilst over ours thy memory moving makes 
A shadow, and a silence in our talk. 
Get thee from hence, all that now remains 
Of one we honour'd ! Till the hand that holds 
The keys of heaven hath ope'd for thee the doors 
Of life in that far distance, let mine eye 
See thee no more. Go from us !' 

Even then, 
Even whilst he spake, like some sweet miracle, 
From darkening lands that glimmer'd through the doors 
Came, faintly heard along the filmy air 
That bore it floating near, a choral chant 



72 TANNHAUSER; 

Of pilgrims pacing by the castle wall ; 
And ' salvum mefac Domine ' they sung 
Sonorous, in the ghostly going out 
Of the red-litten eve along the land. 

Then, like a hand across the heart of him 

That heard it moved that music from afar, 

And beckon'd forth the better hope which leads 

A man's life up along the rugged road 

Of high resolve. Tannhauser moved, as moves 

The folded serpent smitten by the spring 

And stirr'd with sudden sunlight, when he casts 

His spotted skin, and, renovated, gleams 

With novel hues. One lingering long look, 

Wild with remorse and vague with vast regrets, 

He lifted to Elizabeth. His thoughts 

Were then as those dumb creatures in their pain 

That make a language of a look. He toss'd 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 73 

Aloft his arms, and down to the great doors 
Withdroop'd brows striding, groan'd ' To Eome ! toEome !' 
Whilst the deep hall behind him caught the cry 
And drove it clamorous after him, from all 
Its hollow roofs reverberating ' Kerne ! 5 

A fleeting darkness thro' the lurid arch ; 

A flying form along the glare beyond ; 

And he was gone. The scowling Eve reach'd out 

Across the hills a fiery arm, and took 

Tannhauser to her, like a sudden death. 

So ended that great Battle of the Bards, 
Whereof some rumour to the end of time 
Will echo in this land. 

And, voided now 
Of all his multitudes, the mighty Hall 
Dumb, dismally dispageanted, laid bare 



74 TANNHAUSER ; 

His ghostly galleries to the mournful moon ; 
And Night came down, and Silence, and Ihe twain 
Mingled beneath the starlight. Wheel'd at will 
The flitter- winged bat round lonely towers 
Where, one by one, from darkening casements died 
The taper's shine ; the howlet from the hills 
Whoop'd : and Elizabeth, alone with Night 
And Silence, and the Ghost of her slain youth, 
Lay lost among the ruins of that day. 

As when the buffeting gusts, that adverse blow 
Over the Caribbean Sea, conspire 
Conflicting breaths, and, savagely begot, 
The fierce tornado rotatory wheels, 
Or sweeps centripetal, or, all forces join'd, 
Whirls circling o'er the madden'd waves, and they 
Lift up their foaming backs beneath the keel 
Of some frail vessel, and, careering high 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 75 

Over a sunken rock, with a sudden plunge 
Confound her, — stunn'd and strain'd, upon the peak 
Poising one moment, ere she forward fall 
To float, dishelm'd, a wreck upon the waves : 
So rose, engender'd by what furious blasts 
Of passion, that fell hurricane that swept 
Elizabeth to her doom, and left her now 
A helmless hull upon the savage seas 
Of life, without an aim, to float forlorn. 

Longwhile, still shuddering from the shock that jarr'd 

The bases of her being, piteous wreck 

Of ruin'd hopes, upon her couch she lay, 

Of life and time oblivious ; all her mind, 

Lock'd in a rigid agony of grief, 

Clasping, convulsed, its unwept woe ; her heart 

Writhing and riven ; and her burthen'd brain 

Blind with the weight of tears that would not flow. 



76 TANNHAUSER ; 

But when, at last, the healing hand of Time 
Had wrought repair upon her shatter'd frame ; 
And those unskill'd physicians of the mind — 
Importunate, fond friends, a host of kin — 
Drew her perforce from solitude, she pass'd 
Back to the world, and walk'd its weary ways 
With dull mechanic motions, such as make 
A mockery of life. Yet gave she never, 
By weeping or by wailing, outward sign 
Of that great inward agony that she bore ; 
For she was not of those whose sternest sorrow 
Outpours in plaints, or weeps itself in dew ; 
Not passionate she, nor of the happy souls 
Whose grief comes temper'd with the gift of tears. 

So, through long weeks and many a weary moon, 

Silent and self-involved, without a sigh, 

She suffer'd. There, whence consolation comes, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 77 

She sought it — at the foot of Jesu's cross, 
And on the bosom of the Virgin-spouse, 
And in communion with the blessed Saints. 
But chief for him she pray'd whose grievous sin 
Had wrought her desolation ; God besought 
To touch the leprous soul and make it clean ; 
And sued the Heavenly Pastor to recall 
The lost sheep, wander'd from the pleasant ways, 
Back to the pasture of the paths of peace. 
So thrice a day, what time the blushing morn 
Crimson'd the orient sky, and when the sun 
Glared from mid-heaven or welter'd in the west, 
Fervent she pray'd ; nor in the night forewent 
Her vigils ; till at last from prayer she drew 
A calm into her soul, and in that calm 
Heard a low whisper — like the breeze that breaks 
The deep peace of the forest ere the chirp 
Of earliest bird salutes the advent Day — 
Thrill through her, herald of the dawn of Hope. 



78 TANNHAUSER ; 

Then most she loved from forth her leafy tower 

Listless to watch the irrevocable clouds 

Eoll on, and daylight waste itself away 

Along those dreaming woods, whence evermore 

She mused, ' He will return ;' and fondly wove 

Her webs of wistful fantasy till the moon 

Was high in heaven, and in its light she kneel'd, 

A faded watcher through the weary night, 

A meek, sweet statue at the silver shrines, 

In deep, perpetual prayer for him she loved. 

And from the pitying Sisterhood of Saints 
Haply that prayer shall win an angel down 
To be his unseen minister, and draw 
A drowning conscience from the deeps of Hell. 

Time put his sickle in among the days. 
Blithe Summer came, and into dimples danced 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS, 79 

The fair and fructifying Earth, anon 

Showering the gather'd guerdon of her play 

Into the lap of Autumn ; Autumn stored 

The gift, piled ready to the palsied hand 

Of blind and begging Winter ; and when he 

Closed his well-provender'd days, Spring lightly came 

And scatter'd sweets upon his sullen grave. 

And twice the seasons pass'd, the sisters three 

Doing glad service for their hoary brother, 

And twice twelve moons had wax'd and waned, and 

twice 
The weary world had pilgrim'd round the sun, 
When from the outskirts of the land there came 
Eumour of footsore penitents from Eome 
Beturning, jubilant of remitted sin. 

So chanced it, on a silent April eve 

The westering sun along the Wartburg vale 



80 TANNHAUSER; 

Shot level beams, and into glory touch'd 

The image of Madonna — where it stands 

Hard by the common way that climbs the steep — 

The image of Madonna, and the face 

Of meek Elizabeth turn'd towards the Queen 

Of Sorrows, sorrowful in patient prayer ; 

When, through the silence and the sleepy leaves, 

A breeze blew up the vale, and on the breeze 

Floated a plaintive music. She that heard, 

Trembled ; the prayer upon her parted lips 

Suspended hung, and one swift hand she press'd 

Against the palpitating heart whose throbs 

Confused the cunning of her ears. Ah God ! 

Was this the voice of her recurning joy ? 

The psalm of shriven pilgrims to their homes 

Betuming? Ay ! it swells upon the breeze 

The ' Nunc Dimittis ' of glad souls that sue 

After salvation seen to part in peace. 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 81 

Then up she sprung, and to a neighbouring copse 
Swift as a startled hind, when the ghostly moon 
Draws sudden o'er the silver'd heather-bells 
The monstrous shadow of a cloud, she sped ; 
Pausing, low- crouch' d, within a maze of shrubs, 
Whose emerald slivers fringed the rugged way 
So broad, the pilgrim's garments as they passed 
Would brush the leaves that hid her. And anon 
They came in double rank, and two by two, 
With cumber'd steps, with haggard gait that told 
Of bodily toil and trouble, with besoil'd 
And tatter'd garments ; natheless with glad eyes, 
Whence look'd the soul disburthen'd of her sin, 
Climbing the rude path, two by two t hey came. 
And she, that watch'd with what intensest gaze 
Them coming, saw old faces that she knew, 
And every face turn'd skywards, while the lips 
Four'd out the heavenly psalm, and every soul 

F 



82 TANNHAUSER ; 

Sitting seraphic in the upturn'd eyes 

With holy fervour rapt upon the song. 

And still they came and pass'd, and still she gazed ; 

And still she thought, ' Now conies he !' and the chant 

Went heavenwards, and the filed pilgrims fared 

Beside her, till their tale well-nigh was told. 

Then o'er her soul a shuddering horror crept, 

And, in that agony of mind that makes 

Doubt more intolerable than despair, 

With sudden hand she brush'd aside the sprays, 

And from the thicket lean'd and look'd. The last 

Of all the pilgrims stcod within the ken 

Of her keen gaze — save him all scann'd, and he 

No sooner scann'd than cancell'd from her eyes 

By vivid lids swept down to lash away 

Him hateful, being other than she sought. 

So for a space, blind with dismay, she paused 

But, he approaching, from the thicket leapt, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. S3 

Clutch'd with wrung hands his robe, and gasp'd, c The 

knight 
i That with you went, returns not ?' In his psalm 
The fervid pilgrim made no pause, yet gazed 
At his wild questioner, intelligent 
Of her demand, and shook his head and pass'd. 
Then she, with that mute answer stabb'd to the heart, 
Sprung forward, clutch'd him yet once more, and cried, 
' In Mary's name, and in the name of God, 
Eeceived the knight his shrift ?' And, once again, 
The pilgrim, sorrowful, shook his head and sigh'd, 
Sigh'd in the singing of his psalm, and pass'd. 

Then prone she fell upon her face, and prone 
Within her mind Hope's shatter'd fabric fell — 
The dear and delicate fabric of frail Hope 
Wrought by the simple cunning of her thoughts, 
That, labouring long, through many a dreamy day 



84 TANNHAUSER ; 

And many a vigil of the wakeful night, 
Piecemeal had rear'd it, patiently, with pain, 
From out the ruins of her ancient peace. 
O, ancient Peace ! that never shalt return ; 
O, ruin'd Hope ! 0, Fancy ! over-fond, 
Futile artificer that build'st on air, 
Marr'd is thy handiwork, and thou shalt please 
With plastic fantasies her soul no more. 

So lay she cold against the callous ground. 
Her pale face pillow'd on a stone, her eyes 
Wide open, fix'd into a ghastly stare 
That knew no speculation ; for her mind 
Was dark, and all her faculty of thought 
Compassionately cancell'd. But she lay 
Kot in the embrace of loyal Death, who keeps 
His bride for ever, but in treacherous arms 
Of Sleep that, sated, will restore to Grief 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 85 

Her, snatch'd a sweet space from his cruel clutch. 
So lay she cold against the callous ground, 
And none was near to heed her, as the sun, 
About him drawing the vast-skirted clouds, 
Went down behind the western hill to die. 

Now Wolfram, when the rumour reach'd his ears 

That, from their quest of saving grace retum'd, 

The pilgrims all within the castle court 

Were gather'd, flock'd about by happy friends, 

Pass'd from his portal swiftly, and ran out 

And join'd the clustering crowd. Full many a face, 

Wasted and wan, he recogniz'd, and clasp'd 

Full many a lean hand clutching at his own, 

Of those who, stretch'd upon the grass, or propp'd 

Against the boulder-stones, were press'd about 

By weeping women, clamorous to unbind 

Their sandal-thongs and bathe the bruised feet. 



36 TANNHAUSER ; 

Then up and down, and swiftly through and through, 

And round about, skirting the crowd, he hurried, 

With greetings fair to all ; till, fill'd with fear, 

Half-hopeless of his quest, yet harbouring hope, 

He paused perplex'd beside the castle gates. 

There, at his side, the youngest of the train, 

A blue-eyed pilgrim tarried, and to him 

Turned Wolfram questioning of Tannhauser's fate ; 

And learnt in few words how, his sin pronounced 

Deadly and irremediable, the knight 

Had faded from before the awful face 

Of Christ's incensed Vicar ; and none knew 

Whither he wander'd, to what desolate lands, 

Hiding his anguish from the eyes of men. 

Then Wolfram groan'd, and clasp'd his hands, and cried 

4 Merciful God !' and fell upon his knees 

In purpose as of prayer — but, suddenly, 

About the gate the crowd moved, and a cry 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 87 

Went up for space, when, rising, he beheld 

Four maids who on a pallet bore the form 

Of wan Elizabeth. The whisper grew 

That she had met the pilgrims, and had learn'd 

Tannhauser's fate, and fall'n beside the way. 

And Wolfram, in the ghastly torchlight, saw 

The white face of the Princess turn'd to his, 

And for a space their eyes met ; then she raised 

One hand towards Heaven, and smiled as who should say, 

' friend, I journey unto God ; farewell !' 

But he could answer nothing ; for his eyes 

Were blinded by his tears, and through his tears 

Dimly, as in a dream, he saw her borne 

Up the broad granite steps that wind within 

The palace ; and his inner eye, entranced, 

Saw in a vision four great Angels stand,' 

Expectant of her spirit, at the foot 

Of flights of blinding brilliancy of stairs 



88 TANNHAUSER; 

Innumerable, that through the riven skies 

Scaled to the City of the Saints of God. 

Then, when thick night fell on his soul, and all 

The vision fled, he solitary stood 

A crazed man within the castle-court ; 

Whence issuing, with wild eyes and wandering gait, 

He through the darkness, groaning, pass'd away. 

All that lone night, along the haunted hills, 

By dizzy brinks of mountain precipices, 

He fleeted, aimless as an unused wind 

That wastes itself about a wilderness. 

Sometimes from low-brow'd caves, and hollow crofts 

Under the hanging woods, there came and went 

A voice of wail upon the midnight air, 

As of a lost soul mourning ; and the voice 

Was still the voice of his remember'd friend. 

Sometimes (so fancy mock'd the fears she bred !) 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 89 

He heard along the lone and eery land 
Low demon laughters ; and a sullen strain 
Of horror swell'd upon the breeze ; and sounds 
Of wizard dance, with shawm and timbrel, flew 
Ever betwixt waste air and wandering cloud 
O'er pathless peaks. Then, in the distance toll'd, 
Or seem'd to toll, a knell : the breezes dropp'd : 
And, in the sudden pause, that passing bell 
With ghostly summons bade him back return 
To where, till dawn, a shade among the shades 
Of Wartburg, watching one lone tower, he saw 
A light that waned with all his earthly hopes. 
The calm Dawn came and from the eastern cliff, 
Athwart the glistening slopes and cold green copse, 
Oall'd to him, careless of a grief not hers ; 
But he, from all her babbling birds, and all 
Her vexing sunlight, with a weary heart 
Drew close the darkness of the glens and glades 



90 TANNHAUSER ; 

About hiin, flying through, the forest deeps. 

And day and night, dim eve and dewy dawn, 

Three times returning, went uncared for by ; 

And thrice the double twilights rose and fell 

About a land where nothing seein'd the same, 

At eve or dawn, as in the time gone by. 

But, when the fourth day like a stranger slipp'd 

To his unhonour'd grave, God's Angel pass'd 

Across the threshold of the Landgrave's hall, 

And in his bosom bore to endless peace 

The weary spirit of Elizabeth. 

Then, in that hour when Death with gentle hand 

Had droop'd the quiet eyelids o'er the eyes 

That Wolfram loved, to Wolfram's heart there came 

A calmness like the calmness of a grave 

Wall'd safe from all the noisy walks of men 

In some green place of peace where daisies grow. 

His tears fell in the twilight with the dews, 



OE, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 91 

Soft as the dews that with the twilight fell, 

When, over scarr'd and weather- wounded walls, 

Sharp-jagged mountain cones, and tangled quicks, 

Eve's spirit, settling, laid the land to sleep 

In skyey trance. Nor yet less soft to fuse 

Memory with hope, and earth with heaven, to him, 

Athwart the harsher anguish of that day, 

There stole with tears the tender human sense 

Of heavenly mercy. Through that milder mood, 

Like waifs that float to shore when storms are spent, 

Flow'd to his heart old memories of his friend, 

O'erwoven with the weed of other griefs, 

Of other griefs for her that grieved no more — 

And of that time when, like a blazing star 

That moves and mounts between the Lyre and Crown, 

Tannhauser shone ; ere sin came, and with sin 

Sorrow. And now if yet Tannhauser lived 

None knew : and if he lived, what hope in life ? 



92 TANNHAUSER ; 

And if he lived no more, what rest in death ? 
But every way the dreadful doom of sin. 

Thus, musing much on all the mystery 
Of life, and death, and love that will not die, 
He wander'd forth, incurious of the way ; 
Which took the wont of other days, and wound 
Along the valley. Now the nodding star 
Of even, and the deep the dewy hour 
Held all the sleeping circle of the hills ; 
Nor any cloud the stainless heavens obscured, 
Save where, o'er Horsel folded in the frown 
Of all his wicked woods, a fleecy fringe 
Of vapour veil'd the slowly sinking moon. 
There, in the shade, the stillness, o'er his harp 
Leaning, of love, and life, and death he sang 
A song to which from all her aery caves 
The mountain echo murmur'd in her sleep. 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 93 

But, as the last strain of his solemn song 
Died off among the solitary stars, 
There came in answer from the folded hills 
A note of human woe. He turn'd, he look'd 
That way the sound came o'er the lonely air ; 
And, seeing, yet believed not that he saw, 
But, nearer moving, saw indeed hard-by, 
Dark in the darkness of a neighbouring hill, 
Lying among the splinter'd stones and stubs 
Flat in the fern, with limbs diffused as one 
That, having fallen, cares to rise no more, 
A pilgrim ; all his weeds of pilgrimage 
Hanging and torn, his sandals stain'd with blood 
Of bruised feet, and, broken in his hand, 
His wreathed staff. 

And Wolfram wistfully 
Look'd in his face, and knew it not. ' Alas ! 



94 TANNHAUSER ; 

Not him,' he murniur'd, ' not my friend !' And then, 
4 What art thou, pilgrim ? whence thy way? how fall'n 
In this wild glen ? at this lone hour abroad 
"When only Grief is stirring?' Unto whom 
That other, where he lay in the long grass, 
Not rising, but with petulant gesture, ' Hence ! 
Whate'er I am, it skills not. Thee I know 
Full well, Sir Wolfram of the Willow-brook, 
The Well-beloved Singer !' 

Like a dart 
From a friend's hand that voice thro' Wolfram went : 
For memory over all the ravaged form 
Wherefrom it issued, wandering, fail'd to find 
The man she mourn' d ; but Wolfram, to the voice 
No stranger, started smit with pain, as all 
The past on those sharp tones came back to break 
His heart with hopeless knowledge. And he cried, 
8 Alas, my brother !' Such a change, so drear, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 95 

In all so unlike all that once lie was 
Show'd the lost knight Tannhauser, where he lay- 
Fallen across the split and morsell'd crags 
Like a dismantled rain. And Wolfram said, 
' lost ! how comest thou, unabsolved, once more 
Among these valleys visited by death, 
And shadow'd with the shadow of thy sin ? 
Whereto in scorn Tannhauser, ' Be at rest 

fearful in thy righteousness ! not thee, 
Nor grace of thine, I seek.' 

Speaking, he rose 
The spectre of a beauty waned away ; 
And, like a hollow echo of himself 
Mocking his own last words, he murmur'd, ' Seek ! 

1 Alas ! what seek I here, or anywhere ? 
Whose way of life is like the crumbled stair 
That winds and winds about a ruin'd tower, 
And leads no-whither !' 



96 TANNHAUSER ; 

But Wolfram cried, ' Yet turn ! 
; For, as I live, I will not leave thee thus. 
My life shall be about thee, and my voice 
Lure scared Hope back to find a resting-place 
Even in the jaws of Death. I do adjure thee, 
By all that friendship yet may claim, declare 
That, even though unabsolved, not uncontrite, 
Thy soul no more hath lapsed into the snare 
Of that disastrous sorcery. Bid me hail, 
Seen through the darkness of thy desolation, 
Some light of purer purpose ; since I deem 
Not void of purpose hast thou sought these paths 
That range among the places of the past ; 
And I will make defeat of Grief with such 
True fellowship of tears as shall disarm 
Her right hand of its scorpions ; nor in vain 
My prayers with thine shall batter at the gates 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 97 

Of Mercy, through all antagonisms of fate 
Forcing sharp inlet to her throne in Heaven.' 

Whereat Tannhauser, turning tearless eyes 
On Wolfram, murmur'd mournfully, ' If tears 
' Fiery as those from fallen seraphs distill' d, 
Or centuries of prayers for pardon sigh'd 
Sad, as of souls in purgatorial glooms, 
Might soften condemnation, or restore 
To her, whom most on earth I have offended, 
The holy freight of all her innocent hopes 
Wreck'd in this ruin'd venture, I would weep 
Salt oceans from these eyes. But I no more 
May drain the deluge from my heart, no more 
On any breath of sigh or prayer rebuild 
The rainbow of discovenanted Hope. 
Thou, therefore, Wolfram — for her face, when mine 
Is dark for ever, thine eyes may still behold — 

G 



98 TANNHAUSER ; 

Tell her, if thou unblamed may'st speak of one 
Sign'd cross by the curse of God and cancell'd out, 
How, at the last, though in remorse of all 
That makes allegiance void and valueless, 
To me has come, with knowledge of my loss, 
Fealty to that pure passion, once betray'd, 
Wherewith I loved, and love her.' 

There his voice, 
Even as a wave that, touching on the shore 
To which it travell'd, is shiver' d and diffused, 
Sank, scatter'd into spray of wasteful sighs, 
And back dissolved into the deeper grief. 

To whom, Wolfram, ' Oh answer by the faith 
In which mankind are kindred, art thou not 
From Eome, unhappiest?' ' From Eome ? ah me !' 
He mutter'd, * Eome is far off, very far, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 99 

And weary is the way !' But undeterr'd 

Wolfram renew'd, ' And hast thou not beheld 

The face of Christ's High Vicar ?' And again, 

' Pass on,' he nratter'd, * what is that to thee ?' 

Whereto, with sorrowful voice, Wolfram, ' all, 

And all in all to me that love my friend !' 

' My friend !' Tannhauser laugh'd a bitter laugh. 

Then sadlier said, ' What thou wou ld'st know, once known , 

c Will cause thee to recall that wasted word 

And cancel all the kindness in thy thoughts ; 

Yet shalt thou learn my misery, and learn 

The man so changed, whom once thou calledst " friend," 

That unto him the memory of himself 

Is as a stranger.' Then, with eyes that swam 

True sorrow, Wolfram stretch'd his arms and sought 

To clasp Tannhauser to him : but the other 

Waved him away, and with a shout that sprang 

Fierce with self-scorn from misery's deepest depth, 



100 TANNHAUSER; 

1 A vaunt !' he cried, ' the ground whereon I tread, 
Is ground accurst ! 

' Yet stand not so far off 
But what thine ears, if yet they will, may take 
The tale thy lips from mine have sought to learn ; 
Then, sign thyself, and peaceful go thy ways.' 
And Wolfram, for the grief that choked his voice, 
Could only murmur ' Speak !' But for a while 
Tannhauser to sad silence gave his heart ; 
Then fetch'd back some far thought, sighing, and said ; 

1 Wolfram, by the love of lovelier days 
Believe I am not so far fallen away 
From all I was while we might yet be friends, 
But what these words, haply my last, are true : 
True as my heart's deep woe what time I felt 
Cold on my brow tears wept, and wept in vain, 
For me, among the scorn of alter 'd friends, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 101 

Parting that day for Borne. Kemember this : 
That when, in the after years to which I pass 
A by- word, and a mockery, and no more, 
Thou, honoured still by honourable men, 
Shalt hear my name dishonour'd, thou may'st say, 
" Greatly he grieved for that great sin he sinn'd." 

' Ever, as up the windy alpine way. 

We halting oft by cloudy convent doors, 

My fellow pilgrims warm'd themselves within, 

And ate and drank, and slept their sleep, all night 

I, fasting, slept not ; but in ice and snow 

Wept, aye remembering her that wept for me, 

And loath'd the sin within me. When at length 

Our way lay under garden terraces 

Strewn with their dropping blossoms, thick with scents, 

Among the towers and towns of Italy, 

Whose sumptuous airs along them, like the ghosts 



102 TANNHAUSER; 

Of their old gods, went sighing, I nor look'd 
Nor linger'd, but with, bandaged eyeballs prest, 
Impatient, to the city of the shrine 
Of my desired salvation. There by night 
We enter'd. There, all night, forlorn I lay 
Bruised, broken, bleeding, all my garments torn, 
And all my spirit stricken with remorse, 
Prostrate beneath the great cathedral stairs. 
So the dawn found me. From a hundred spires 
A hundred silvery chimes rang joy : but I 
Lay folded in the shadow of my shame, 
Darkening the daylight from me in the dust. 
Then came a sound of solemn music flowing 
To where I crouch'd ; voices and trampling feet : 
And, girt by all his crimson cardinals, 
In all his pomp the sovran Pontiff stood 
Before me in the centre of my hopes ; 
Which trembled round him into glorious shapes, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 103 

Golden, as clouds that ring the risen sun. 
And all the people, all the pilgrims, fell 
Low at his sacred feet, confess'd their sins, 
And, pardon'd, rose with psalms of jubilee 
And confident glad faces. 

' Then I sprang 
To where he paused above me ; with wild hands 
Clutch'd at the skirts I could not reach ; and sank 
Shiveringly back ; crying, " holy, and high, 
And terrible, that hast the keys of heaven ! 
Thou that dost bind and dost unloose, from me, 
For Mary's sake, and the sweet Saints, unbind 
The grievous burthen of the curse I bear." 
And when he question'd, and I told him all 
The sin that smoulder'd in my blood, how bred, 
And all the strangeness of it, then his face 
Was as the Judgment Angel's ; and I hid 
My own ; and, hidden from his eyes, I heard : 



104 TANNHAUSER ; 

' " Hast thou within the nets of Satan lain ? 
Hast thou thy soul to her perdition pledged ? 
Hast thou thy lip to Hell's Enchantress lent, 
To drain damnation from her reeking cup ? 
Then know that sooner from the wither'd staff 
That in my hand I hold green leaves shall spring, 
Than from the brand in hell-fire scorch'd rebloom 
The blossoms of salvation." 

' The voice ceased, 
' Aud, with it all things from my sense. I waked 
I know not when, but all the place was dark : 
Above me, and about me, and within 
Darkness : and from that hour by moon or sun 
Darkness unutterable as of death 
Where'er I walk. But death himself is near ! 
Oh, might I once more see her, unseen ; unheard, 
Hear her once more ; or know that she forgives 






OS, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 105 



Whom Heaven forgives not, nor his own lost peace ; 
I think that even among the nether fires 
And those dark fields of Doom to which I pass, 
Some blessing yet would haunt me.' 

Sorrowfully 
He rose among the tumbled rocks and lean'd 
Against the dark. As one that many a year, 
Sunder'd by savage seas unsociable 
From kin and country, in a desert isle 
Dwelling till half dishumaniz'd, beholds 
Haply, one eve, a far-off sail go by, 
That brings old thoughts of home across his heart ; 
And still the man who thinks — ' They are all gone, 
Or changed, that loved me once, and I myself 
No more the same' — watches the dwindling speck 
With weary eyes, nor shouts, nor waves a hand ; 
But after, when the night is left alone, 
A sadness falls upon him, and he feels 



106 TANNHAUSER; 

More solitary in his solitudes, 
And tears come starting fast ; so, tearful, stood 
Tannhauser, whilst his melancholy thoughts, 
From following up far-off a waning hope, 
Back to himself came, one by one, more sad 
Because of sadness troubled. 

Yet not long 
He rested thus ; but murmur'd, ' Now, farewell ! 
4 1 go to hide me darkly in the groves 
That she was wont to haunt ; where some sweet chance 
Haply may yield me sight of her, and I 
May stoop, she pass'd away, to kiss the ground 
Made sacred by her passage ere I die.' 
But him departing Wolfram held, ' Yain ! vain ! 
' Thy footstep sways with fever, and thy mind 
Wavers within thy restless eyes. Lie here, 
unrejected, in my arms, and rest !' 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 107 

Now o'er the cumbrous hills began to creep 

A thin and watery light : a whisper went 

Vague through the vast and dusky- volum'd woods : 

And, uncompanion'd, from a drowsy copse 

Hard-by a solitary chirp came cold : 

While, spent with inmost trouble, Tannhauser lean'd 

His wan cheek pillow'd upon Wolfram's breast, 

Calm, as in death, with placid lids down lock'd. 

And Wolfram pray'd within his heart, ' Ah, God ! 

4 Let him not die, not yet, not thus, with all 

The sin upon his spirit !' But while he pray'd 

Tannhauser raised delirious looks, and sigh'd, 

' Hearest thou not the happy songs they sing me ? 

Seest thou not the lovely floating forms ? 

fair, and fairer far than fancy fashion'd ! 

sweet the sweetness of the songs they sing ! 

For thee, . . . they sing . . . the goddess waits : for thee 



108 TANNHAUSER ; 

With braided blooms the balmy couch is strewn, 
And loosed for thee . . . they sing . . . the golden zone. 
Fragrant for thee the lighted spices fume 
With streaming incense sweet, and sweet for thee 
The scatter d rose, the myrtle crown, the cup, 
The nectar-cup for thee ! . . . they sing. Bet urn, 
Though late, too long desired, ... I hear them sing, 
Delay no more delights too long delayed : 
Turn to thy rest ; . . . they sing . . . the married doves 
Murmur ; the Fays soft-sparkling tapers tend ; 
The odours burn the purple bowers among ; 
And Love for thee, and Beauty, waits! . . . they sing.' 

' Ah me ! ah madman !' Wolfram cried, ' yet cram 
Thy cheated ears, nor chase with credulous heart 
The fair dissembling of that dream. For thee 
Not roses now, but thorns ; nor myrtle wreath, 
But cypress rather and the graveyard flower 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 109 

Befitting saddest brows ; nor nectar pour'd, 
But prayers and tears ! For thee in yonder skies 
An Angel strives with Sin and Death ; for thee 
Yet pleads a spirit purer than thine own : 
For she is gone ! gone to the breast of God ! 
Thy Guardian Angel, while she walk'd the earth, 
Thine intercessionary Saint while now 
For thee she sues about the Throne of Thrones, 
Beyond the stars, our star, Elizabeth !' 

Then Wolfram felt the shatter'd frame that lean'd 
Across his breast with sudden spasms convulsed. 
' Dead ! is she dead ?' Tannhauser murmur'd, ' dead ! 
Gone to the grave, so young ! murder'd — by me ! 
Dead — and by my great sin ! Wolfram, turn 
Thy face from mine. I am a dying man !' 
And Wolfram answer'd, ' Dying ? ah, not thus ! 
1 Yet make one sign thou dost repent the past, 



110 TANNHAUSER; 

One word, but one ! to say thou hast abhorr'd 
That false she devil that, with her damned charms, 
Hath wrought this ruin ; and I, though all the world 
Eoar out against thee, ay ! though fiends of hell 
Howl from the deeps, yet I, thy friend, even yet 
Will cry them " Peace !" and trust the hope I hold 
Against all desperate odds, and deem thee saved.' 
Whereto Tannhauser, speaking faintly, ' Friend, 
The fiend that haunts in ruins through my heart 
Will wander sometimes. In the nets I trip, 
When most I fret the meshes. These spent shafts 
Are of a sickly brain that shoots awry, 
Aiming at something better. Bear with me. 
I die : I pass I know not whither : yet know 
That I die penitent. Wolfram, pray, 
Pray for my soul ! I cannot pray myself. 
I dare not hope : and yet I would not die 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. Ill 

Without a hope, if any hope, though faint 
And far beyond this darkness, yet may dwell 
In the dear death of Him that died for all.' 

He whispering thus ; far in the Aurorean East 
. The ruddy sun, uprising, sharply smote 
A golden finger on the airy harps 
By Morning hung within her leafy bowers ; 
And all about the budded dells, and woods 
With sparkling-tassell'd tops, from birds and brooks 
A hundred hallelujahs hail'd the light. 
The whitethorn glisten' d from the wakening glen : 
O'er golden gravel danced the dawning rills : 
All the delighted leaves by copse and glade 
Gamboll'd ; and breezy bleatings came from flocks 
Far off in pleasant pastures fed with dew. 

But whilst, unconscious of the silent change 



112 .TANNHAUSER; 

Thus stol'n around him, o'er the dying bard 

Hung Wolfram, on the breeze there came a sound 

Of mourning moving down the narrow glen ; 

And, looking up, he suddenly was ware 

Of four white maidens, moving in the van 

Of four black monks who bore upon her bier 

The flower-strewn corpse of young Elizabeth. 

And after these, from all the castled hills, 

A multitude of lieges and of lords ; 

A multitude of men at arms, with all 

Their morions hung with mourning ; and in midst, 

His worn cheek channell'd with unwonted tears, 

The Landgrave, weeping for Elizabeth. 

These, as the sad procession nearer wound, 

And nearer, trampling bare the feathery weed 

To where Sir Wolfram rested o'er his friend, 

Tannhauser caught upon his dying gaze ; 

And caught, perchance, upon the inward eye, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 113 

Far, far beyond the corpse, the bier, and far 

Beyond the widening circle of the sun, 

Some sequel of that vision Wolfram saw : 

The crowned Spirit by the Jasper Gates ; 

The four white Angels o'er the walls of Heaven ; 

The shores where, tideless, sleep the seas of Time 

Soft by the City of the Saints of God. 

Forth, with the strength that lastly comes to break 
All bonds, from Wolfram's folding arm he leapt, 
Clamber'd the pebbly path, and, groaning, fell 
Flat on the bier of love— his bourn at last ! 
Then, even then, while question question chased 
About the ruffled circle of that grief, 
And all was hubbub by the bier, a noise 
Of shouts and hymns brake in across the hills, 
That now o'erflow'd with hurrying feet ; and came, 
Dash'd to the hip with travel, and dew'd with haste, 

H 



114 TANNHAUSER; 

A flying post, and in his hand he bore 

A wither 'd staff o'erflourish'd with green leaves ; 

Who, — follow'd by a crowd of youth and eld, 

That sang to stun with sound the lark in heaven, 

4 A miracle ! a miracle from Eome ! 

Glory to God that makes the bare bough green ! ' — 

Sprang in the midst, and, hot for answer, ask'd 

News of the Knight Tannhauser. 

Then a monk 
Of those that, stoled in sable, bore the bier 
Pointing, with sorrowful hand, - Behold the man !'■• 
But straight the other, ' Glory be to God ! 
This from the Vicar of the fold of Christ : 
The wither'd staff hath flourish'd into leaves, 
The brand shall bloom, though burn'd with fire, and thou 
— Thy soul from sin be saved !' To whom, with tears 
That flasli'd from lowering lids, Wolfram replied ; 
6 To him a swifter message, from a source 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 115 

Mightier than whence thou comest, hath been vouch- 
safed. 
See these stark hands, blind eyes, and bloodless lips, 
This shatter'd remnant of a once fair form, 
Late home of desolation, now the husk 
And ruin'd chrysalis of a regal spirit 
That up to heaven hath parted on the wing ! 
But thou, to Eome returning with hot speed, 
Tell the high Vicar of the Fold of Christ 
How that lost sheep his rescuing hand would reach, 
Although by thee unfound, is found indeed, 
And in the Shepherd's bosom lies at peace.' 

And they that heard him lifted up the voice 
And wept. But they that stood about the hills 
Far off, not knowing, ceased not to cry out, 
6 Glory to God that makes the bare bough green !' 
Till Echo, from the inmost heart of all 



116 TANNHAUSER; 

That mellowing morn blown open like a rose 
To round and ripen to the perfect noon, 
Kesounded, ' Glory ! glory !' and the rocks 
From glen to glen rang, ' Glory unto God !' 

And so those twain, sever'd by Life and Sin, 
By Love and Death united, in one grave 
Slept. But Sir Wolfram pass'd into the wilds : 
There, with long labour of his hands, he hew'd 
A hermitage from out the hollow rock, 
Wherein he dwelt, a solitary man. 
There, many a year, at nightfall or at dawn, 
The pilgrim paused, nor ever paused in vain, 
For words of cheer along his weary way. 
But once, upon a windy night, men heard 
A noise of rustling wings, and at the dawn 
They found the hermit parted to his peace. 
The place is yet. The youngest pilgrim knows, 



OR, THE BATTLE OF THE BARDS. 117 

And loves it. Three grey rocks ; and, over these, 
A mountain ash that, mourning, bead by bead, 
Drops her red rosary on a ruin'd cell. 



So sang the Saxon Bard. And when he ceased, 
The women's cheeks were wet with tears ; but all 
The broad-blown Barons roar'd applause, and flow'd 
The jostling tankards prodigal of wine. 



THE END. 



LONDON : 

PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET 
AND CHARING CROSS. 



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